Post 3 10/23

   A concept from Epstein that can be difficult to understand is in Chapter 11, which talks about different types of fallacies. According to Epstein, a fallacy is "a bad argument of one of the types that have been agreed to be typically unrepairable" (199). This definition from the book seemed to be somewhat confusing, and another description I found from the website http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/ describes a fallacy as "an error in reasoning." There are two types of fallacies, in which a deductive fallacy is an invalid fallacy whose premises are true and the conclusion is false. An inductive fallacy is "less formal" and "the premises do not provide enough support for the conclusion."

   For the project, I worked on the fallacies part of the paper and a new fallacy which i found is "mob appeal." The website http://www.renewamerica.com/columns/abbott/041105 describes mob appeal as a fallacy which "encourages the viewer to join the preverbial throngs of people who are doing a particular act."

Social Organizations

    Both class projects have been very useful and it is fun and interesting to work with classmates from an online class whose blogs we are commenting on each week because we can actually get to meet them. So far I have found the second project, Critical Thinking and Social Organizations, more useful and entertaining. I have always heard about different social organizations such as American Red Cross, Green Peace, MADD, and PETA, but have never taken the time to research them and find out what their different goals are.
   My group chose PETA for our project, which stands for People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. This group goes to very far lengths to let their message be known that they want people to "Go Veg" by not wearing any type of animal fur or skin and not eating meat. This made for a good topic because it was very amusing to see the pictures of people locking themselves in cages, or getting wrapped up in serran wrap, like they are a piece of grocery meat. I was able to find out about the different types of reasoning and the fallacies used by PETA. Also, it was helpful to learn APA format for this project because I have always used MLA and was not familiar with APA at all.

Ch 8 General Claims

According to Epstein, general claims "assert something in a general way about all or part of a collection" (159). An example of a general claim is "All good students do their homework. Bob did his homework. So bob is a good student. Although it is a general claim, it is not valid because the premises may be true, yet Bob might not have completed all of his assigned homework from last week. 

When making a general claim, there are very clear meanings to certain words such as all, some, no and only, so you have to be careful about what you say in the claim. When someone claims that "all" athletes are fast, there are also saying that everyone who is an athlete is fast. Also, stating that "some" pit bulls are nice, means that at least one pit bull is nice. Other words which Epstein clarifies are "no," which also means "every single one is not" (160). Also, the contradictory of a claim has opposite truth value. For example, for a claim being "some babies cry," the contradictory would be "no babies cry."

Slippery Slope

Something that I found interesting which corresponds to Compound Claims in Chapter 6 is a slippery slope argument. According to Epstein, a slippery slope argument is a "bad argument that uses a chain of conditionals, at least one of which is false or dubious." In order for something to be a conditional claim, the claim must be able to be rewritten as "if...then..." or "if A, then B." Here is an example of a slippery slope argument between two people: 

A: Don't move to Southern California.

B: Why not?

A: Because going to the beach is your favorite thing to do and if you move to Southern California, you will end up staying there forever.

B: What's wrong with that?

A: Then you will not be able to see your family and friends every day. You will have to make new friends. Those people won't even be as nice as us. Soon you will be stuck down there with people you do not like, looking for a new job, and regretting that you moved.

B: Okay you are right. I'll stay in Northern California instead.

Ch. 7 Counterarguments

Something that corresponds with counterarguments is the act of refuting an argument. In order to refute, or argue against, an argument, there are different steps which must be taken into consideration. You must show that the argument is not valid or strong, that at least one of the premises is debatable, and that the conclusion is false.
An argument that can be refuted is: It is pointless to buy a brand new car. They all look cool on the freeway and make you feel good. However, over time the value drops tremendously. So it is pointless to buy a brand new car. You can object to the premise that they all look cool, and attack the conclusion by stating that some do not lose value and that it is a smart buy to get a new car.
Another aspect of a counterargument is refuting indirectly. Even though there is something wrong with the premises, sometimes you just cannot pan out which premise is actually debatable. Some arguments like this are refuted by reducing to the absurd, which is when you show that several of the claims are actually false and lead to an inaccurate conclusion.

Chapter 6 Compound Claims

A factor that applies to the structure of arguments is a compound claim. According to Epstein, a compound claim is "one composed of other claims, but which has to be viewed as just one claim." The propositional function of a compound claim depends on the truth-values of the claims that come along with it. An example of a compound claim is "either I will finish my homework tonight or I will wake up early and finish it right before class." When looking at a compound claim, the alternative will be the part of the "or" claim.

A conditional claim is a type of compound claim. If a statement is to be considered a conditional claim, you have to be able to re-write the claim as "if...then..." The statement after "if" is known as the antecedent and the statement after "then" is known as the consequent. An example of a conditional claim is "If the Oakland Raiders make the playoffs this year it will be a miracle." In this claim the antecedent is "the Oakland Raiders make the playoffs," and the consequent is "it will be a miracle."

Common Mistakes

When you are evaluating premises of an argument, there are many different types of common mistakes which can be made. The first is arguing backwards, which according to Epstein is "a mistake to reason that because we have a strong or valid argument with a true conclusion, its premises must be true."
For example, Bryan went out to dinner to eat and was unaware of the ingredients in a certain sauce. Bryan is allergic to seafood. So Bryan has been swelling up in the throat. This is backwards because it is arguing from the truth of the conclusion back to the truth of the premises, meaning that Bryan might just have a cold.

Another common mistake is bad appeal to authority. This is when we tend to believe a claim just because of who said it. For example, when President Obama says that "our economy is improving everyday," and people instantly believe so because that is what the President said, it is a bad appeal to authority. Other mistakes are the confusion of plausibility with possibility, mistaking the person for a claim or for the argument.

Here is the link to my ad for advertising and the internet: http://espn.go.com/
ESPN is a sports website which has many different ads each day. Besides all of the sports scores and news, ESPN has ads for movies such ass "Jackass 3D," which was being advertised today when i visited the website.
This ad is catchy because it is at the top of the website and is short, but gets straight to the point. It reads, "Jackass 3D experience it in realD 3D and digital 3D, in theaters October 15." This claim is that the movie is coming out on October 15 and that you will be able to watch it in 3D. This claim is believable because it is easily accepted as true and from experience everyone will believe when a movie will be released when an opening date is set, and people make plans to go see the movie. Whether a movie is advertised on the internet, television, or a billboard, they always catch the eye because it is a source of entertainment, which is very intriguing.